Sailing The Bay of Islands to Wellington New Zealand - Beneteau 523 Yacht Delivery 2021

A video showing the 580 Nautical Mile sail to bring our 'new to us' 2005 Beneteau Oceanis 523 yacht home from the Bay of Islands to Wellington New Zealand in Feb 2021.

[@colinboniface194]

nicely done... you got the right choice of beers too...

[@AnzacSailing]

Love it.

[@sharneewatsonmotherhood1613]

🔥🔥

[@Stevecollinsclear]

great insight to your trip. thnx for sharing, please ‘do more’

[@andyl-d6633]

Hey Sam, thanks for the vid. Hope more to come on the 523. I have my eye on one of these myself when we retire in a few years. At the end when you were travelling at 12 knots how many reefs did you have?

[@TURSTY09]

Thanks Andy. I can’t remember exactly but I think it was two reefs and we were over powered with the wind building. We added another and I think we sped up from memory 😂. Having a boom furling main means we have infinite reef points, but we generally use the Battern’s as a guid to reef to.

[@andyl-d6633]

Thanks Sam. Didn’t pick up on the boom furling. She seemed to be handling the 25 knots comfortably .. nice and flat. Looking forward to the next vid!

[@billhanna8838]

Nice steady breeze for wellington Ha , Any reason not taking the east coast ?

[@TURSTY09]

Hey Bill. Surprisingly we have had more days becalmed in Welly since having her home then windy days! We went West for a couple reasons. The weather had a down wind run west and up wind east. And that Wairarapa coast can be brutal with way off weather forecasts and things changing really quickly. We just prefer West because of personal experience mor then anything and more options if things do change (I.e. New Plymouth, Mana, the sounds, Nelson. Lots of different angles to different places if need be)

[@billhanna8838]

@@TURSTY09 Well Done , The Wairarapa coast is reason enough , been there & experienced the weather The only good thing is 9 out of 10 its off the coast but in an hour it changes to the south for the Palliser bay section , All ways fun . Fair winds .

[@davidrumsey3180]

I agree about keeping away from the Wairarapa coast! In 1987 we headed up that side with a forecast of gentle southerlies.. turned into 3 days of over 50 knots... less than fun, especially as we had our children (5 and 3 yrs old) on board, and the satnav set died 12 hours into the trip. During the trip we were trying to pick up Portland Island lighthouse to get a position... but in the morning forecast & notices to mariners it said Portland Island light was extinguished... I had been fairly confident of my DR position and couldn't understand why we weren't seeing the light around 5am. Luckily I had turned East and headed out to sea rather than continue towards Mahia peninsula.. we could have been in serious trouble! A few years ago my wife and I crewed for a friend from Wellington to Opua... we persuaded him to take the West coast.. we had a pretty good trip overall, stopping for one night in New Plymouth on the way, and anchoring for one night between Cape Rienga and North Cape. Looks like that boat can keep up some pretty good speeds without knocking you around too much.

[@andyl-d6633]

Hey Sam, how’s the 523 going? Any new vids planned? What are your thoughts on the boat? Any trips or projects planned? As I mentioned have my eye on a 523 in a few years time so interested to hear yours (and your dad’s) thoughts. Cheers!

[@TURSTY09]

Hey Andy, Shes going good. We just got back from 5 days in the sounds on her picking up an outboard. We crossed the Cook Straight on a 15kt day after a week of 30-40kt winds so the sea state was pretty average, then back again in 20kts after a few stormy 50+ days and she punched straight through it. It would have been very uncomfortable on a launch or smaller yacht, but the sheer weight of this boat give it amazing stability in lumpy seas. A friend of Dad's was on the ferry that passed us and wondered what we were doing out on a day like that haha. It was actually a fun sail back. We had one night of 55kt gusts on anchor. We set a second anchor just in case around midnight, but she held solid and was comfortable motion wise. Just couldn't sleep because of the noise and fear of dragging in that weather. All in all we were very impressed with the boat! I didn't film any of it because we had just come out of lockdown in NZ and I just felt like enjoying the trip, but we did replace all the through hulls and holding tank plumbing a while back and I filmed all that. Just need to get around to editing it!

[@andyl-d6633]

@@TURSTY09 thanks Sam … good to hear you’re enjoying her and looking forward to seeing the vid on the work you’ve done. Thanks for the feedback on stability … that seems to be the attraction to me. Big, solid, beamy and stable = dry and comfortable. My wife has never sailed so I want her to be comfortable as possible to max the chances of her enjoying it. I did a few seasons of inshore/offshore sailing many moons ago on a Young88 (a good Kiwi boat) which was fast for a cruiser but we were always wet … so looking for something very comfortable. How’s the space downstairs? A boat that size should feel fairly roomy? Btw if you would like to take this conversation offline perhaps we can message via email?

[@TURSTY09]

@@andyl-d6633 Yeah feel free to leave me your email addy or flick me a PM on my Instagram account (link in the about tab of my Channel).